


Senseless Wishes

by Dedicate Kiwicrocus (cranky__crocus)



Series: SMACKDOWN '11 R2, R3, Final - CIRCLECEST [2]
Category: Emelan - Tamora Pierce
Genre: F/F, Gen, Goldenlake, smackdown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-03
Updated: 2011-06-03
Packaged: 2017-10-20 02:29:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/207803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cranky__crocus/pseuds/Dedicate%20Kiwicrocus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“To make a wish.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Senseless Wishes

**Author's Note:**

> Written for SMACKDOWN at Goldenlake: fiefgoldenlake.proboards.com

“Rosethorn?”

            “Briar.” The woman had her hands on her hips as she stared out at her garden, watching a green-robed figure between two rows of plants.

            “What’s she up to?” Briar pointed. The figure had pitch-black tight curls falling back, face up toward the stars; it had to be Lark.

            Rosethorn looked at him for all of a second, but in that second he saw a softer face than he often caught. He grinned—so Lark got to _all_ of them, not just the kids. He could hear a grin in Rosethorn’s lips and just barely see it in her profile. “Watching for shooting stars.”

            “What for?”

            “To make a wish.”

            “Why on—”

            “If you have so many questions, go ask _her_.”

            Briar decided against that. He hurried away from a grumpy Rosethorn and up to the second floor. He made it to the roof just in time to see a Rosethorn-shaped figure join the Lark-shaped person in the garden. Rosethorn pointed at the sky just as a star fell to the horizon; Lark laughed and nudged the woman with a shoulder.

 

 

“Tris.” The girl was silent for enough seconds for Briar to lose his patience. “ _Tris_.”

            “ _What?_ ”

            “What makes stars move?”

            “They’re not stars,” she corrected him, pointing at a star in the sky. “Stars are like our sun, but far away. Shooting stars are things that enter our atmosphere and start burning up—things like big rocks.”

            Briar considered this. “What’s the atmosphere?”

            Tris was quiet for a moment. Briar was worried she wouldn’t answer, but then she rolled over and stared at him. “You know when nobles—Bags—have protection spells, that keep you brushing off their stuff, make it hard to touch?”

            Briar nodded. “Why do _you_ know about those?”

            “Nobles don’t always trust _merchants_ , either.” Tris grinned. “But clearly you know them. The atmosphere is a little like those, but made of natural stuff like gases.”

            “Gas like—” Tris read his mind faster than he could speak it.

            “ _No_. You’re such a _boy_.” She sighed. “But yes, when there are scents of any kinds, it’s usually a set of gases. Like that egg smell you complained about last week—that was sulphur.”

            “There’s egg smells up with falling rocks?” Briar looked dubious.

            Tris’ sigh was longer this time. “No, that’s just an _example_. The gases up there are different—I don’t know what they all are. But when the rocks come through it, they move quickly and burn up, which makes the light.”

            “And girls think they’re pretty, even though they’re just big burning rocks in gas.”

            “That sums it.” Tris smiled, or close enough to it.

            “Why do people wish on them?”

            “Who?”

            “Lark wishes on them. Rosethorn said.”

            Tris shrugged both shoulders. “Well _I_ don’t know that one. People are silly.”

            “Ain’t that the right of it.”

            “ _I_ think it sounds nice,” a kinder voice piped up. Briar scrambled up the roof and peered over the other side; there lay Sandry, one leg over Daja’s ankle. Daja grinned up at him.

            “You’re out-numbered again,” she remarked. Her teeth were white as stars. “And I was taught to wish on stars too—but for sensible things, like _kaqs_ to sell us good wear cheap or the winds to be on our side.”

            “I’m not sure what to wish for if I see one. Can you imagine what Lark would wish for?” Sandry asked. “I wonder.”

            “Probably kids with more sense’n to wish on big flaming rocks,” Briar responded. But he flipped onto his back to watch the stars all the same. “What’d Rosethorn wish for, if she were silly like the rest of you?”

            The others groaned, but Tris spoke up, “She’d wish for Discipline’s boy to understand courtesy. And _I_ don’t wish on stars!”

            Briar rolled his eyes. If he had courtesy, Rosethorn’d step all over him. Courtesy was for court-birds like Sandry. Tris was just fooling herself. She liked him well enough, he could tell—she just didn’t like that she did!

 

 

Rosethorn glanced up at the roof and back at Lark, lips close to the woman’s ear. “What did you wish for?”

            “I can’t tell you, you know that,” Lark responded, smiling as she pressed her cheek to her companion’s lips. “But I’ll hint that I didn’t wish for much change.”

            “Good. Although I wouldn’t mind a wish for Briar to plump up some.” When Lark began a slow smile, Rosethorn held up her hand. “I wouldn’t mind _too_ much—but I don’t care either way.”

            “You’re a liar, Rosie; you’re only fooling yourself.” Lark laughed. “But consider it done. You told them what I’m doing, didn’t you?”

            “Briar has more curiosity than he has mischief.”

            Lark caught the movement of a star in her sight. “I hope he stays that way—the others too. I hope they’re all wishing on stars. It’s the stuff of hope.”

            “I hope they’re all teasing you senseless for your puerile pursuits.”

            This received the prodding of an elbow into her side, but they both just laughed.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! C: Hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
